Line #78 Creator/MikeResnick


1	[[quoteright:194:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/mike_resnick.jpg]]
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3	Michael Diamond Resnick (March 5, 1942 – January 9, 2020) was an American writer and editor of {{science fiction}} and {{Fantasy}}, perhaps best known for his many anthologies where he had a variety of writers contribute stories on a special theme--often involving an AlternateHistory. He had also written many novels and short stories of his own. Most of his solo work was generally comedic.
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5	He had won a variety of awards for his short fiction. His novella "Seven Views of Olduvai Gorge" won both the UsefulNotes/{{Hugo\|Award}} and UsefulNotes/NebulaAward, as well as various other international awards.
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7	He regularly collaborated with other writers, including his wife, Carol Resnick. His daughter, Creator/LauraResnick, is also a writer.
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9	----
10	!!Works with a page on this wiki:
11	[[index]]
12	* ''Literature/TheCassandraProject'' (with Creator/JackMcDevitt)
13	* ''Literature/AFableOfTonight'' trilogy (''Stalking the Unicorn'', ''Stalking the Vampire'', and ''Stalking the Dragon'')
14	* ''Literature/TheRedTapeWar'' (with Creator/JackChalker and Creator/GeorgeAlecEffinger)
15	* ''Literature/SantiagoAMythOfTheFarFuture''
16	* The ''Literature/TheFurtherAdventuresOfBatman'' anthology has two contributions:
17	** "Neutral Ground"
18	** "Museum Piece"
19	[[/index]]
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21	[[folder:Selected Other Works]]
22	* ''The Best Rootin' Tootin' Shootin' Gunslinger in the Whole Damn Galaxy''
23	* ''Birthright: The Book of Man''
24	* ''The Branch''
25	* ''The Buntline Special''
26	* ''Dragon America''
27	* The ''Eros'' series:
28	** ''Eros Ascending''
29	** ''Eros at Zenith''
30	** ''Eros Descending''
31	** ''Eros at Nadir''
32	* ''The Goddess of Ganymede'' (his first published novel), and its sequel, ''Pursuit on Ganymede''
33	* ''Ivory''
34	* ''Literature/{{Kirinyaga}}''
35	* ''Lady with an Alien''
36	* ''[[Franchise/TombRaider Lara Croft]]: The Amulet of Power''
37	* ''The Other Teddy Roosevelts'' (collection)
38	* ''The Outpost''
39	* ''Paradise Trilogy'':
40	** ''Paradise''
41	** ''Purgatory''
42	** ''Inferno''
43	* The ''Soothsayer Trilogy'':
44	** ''Soothsayer''
45	** ''Oracle''
46	** ''Prophet''
47	* ''The Starship Series'':
48	** ''Starship: Mutiny''
49	** ''Starship: Pirate''
50	** ''Starship: Mercenary''
51	** ''Starship: Rebel''
52	** ''Starship: Flagship''
53	* ''The Three-Legged Hootch Dancer''
54	* ''The Widowmaker Series'':
55	** ''The Widowmaker''
56	** ''The Widowmaker Reborn''
57	** ''The Widowmaker Unleashed''
58	[[/folder]]
59
60	[[folder:Selected Anthologies]]
61	* ''Alternate Presidents''
62	* ''Alternate Kennedys''
63	* ''Alternate Skiffy''
64	* ''Alternate Tyrants''
65	* ''Alternate Worldcons''
66	* ''Christmas Ghosts''
67	* ''The Dragon Done It''
68	* ''Future Earths: Under African Skies''
69	* ''Future Earths: Under South American Skies''
70	* ''Girls for the Slime God''
71	* ''Return of the Dinosaurs''
72	* ''Sherlock Holmes in Orbit''
73	* ''Whatdunnits''
74	[[/folder]]
75	----
76	!! Tropes in his other works:
77	* BadWithTheBone: In "Seven Views of Olduvai Gorge" the primitive night creatures [[spoiler:(the surviving humans)]] use bones of their fellow tribesmen as weapons [[spoiler:and in the end club Exobiologist to death with a shinbone]].
78	* BoldlyComing: In ''The Outpost'', Hurricane Smith, one of the galaxy's top bounty hunters, has this trope as his main passion in life. He's already had five ex/late-wives, all different alien species, as he finds human women to "all look the same". After he and his fellow bounty hunters help save the galactic human Democracy from a genocidal alien invasion, he is last seen in romantic pursuit of a ''sentient spaceship'' (with female A.I.), as he rebounds from the death-in-battle of his last wife, an insectoid shapeshifter.
79	* CursedWithAwesome: The novella "[[OverlyLongName How I Wrote the New Testament, Ushered in the Renaissance, and Birdied the 17th Hole at Pebble Beach]]" has, as the description puts it, "an itinerant Jewish businessman commanded (condemned?) by Christ to "tarry here until I return," spending the next 2000 years trying to keep busy and occasionally [[BeethovenWasAnAlienSpy helping along the advancement of civilization]]".
80	* DarkMessiah: Immanuel Jeremiah Branch of ''The Branch'' is a strange variation of this. He is the Messiah promised in the Old Testament but is completely self-serving and evil.
81	* DividedStatesOfAmerica: In ''The Buntline Special'' the United States of America's border, as of 1881 stops at the Mississipii River thanks to Indian (specifically Cheyenne and Apache) magic. There are white settlements west of the river but they are independent entities and exist with Indian sufferance.
82	* EarthThatUsedToBeBetter: "Will the Last Person to Leave the Planet Please Turn Off the Sun?" is an exaggerated version; entire countries and ethnic groups have been moving off-planet, and the population of Earth is down to about eight people.
83	* FanConvention: ''Alternate Worldcons'' and ''Again, Alternate Worldcons'', are two anthologies of AlternateHistory stories edited by Resnick, all set at that history's version of the World Science Fiction Convention.
84	* FlyingDutchman: The short story ''[[OverlyLongName How I Wrote the New Testament, Ushered in the Renaissance, and Birdied the 17th Hole at Pebble Beach]]'' goes for a humorous take on the story of the Wandering Jew.
85	* FromBadToWorse: Done to the Nth level in his books ''Paradise'', ''Purgatory'', and ''Inferno'' (which he admits are based upon the histories of Kenya, Zimbabwe, and Uganda, respectively). Particularly appalling is the ending of ''Purgatory,'' where [[spoiler: a tree which was an historic landmark for the natives is chopped down for firewood.]]
86	* GenocideDilemma: Subverted in ''Birthright: The Book of Man''. The other 13,042 sentient races in the Galaxy seem to have no moral qualms whatsoever about hunting Humanity to extinction. It's averted only by the fact that Humanity's last survivors - one man and three women - decide to go out with a bang (literally - they commit suicide by blowing up the planet they're on) rather than surrender and be executed. Same result though, really.
87	* GirlsLoveStuffedAnimals: The protagonist of the ''Soothsayer'' trilogy carries a stuffed animal as a tragic reminder of the only person who ever loved her and the one act of human kindness she ever received.
88	* HumansAreBastards: "A Hunger in the Soul" has an adventurer-journalist abusing and eventually murdering the native inhabitants of an alien world in his quest to find a missing doctor who has developed the cure for a disease ravishing human civilisation. He eventually finds the doctor who has no intention of handing over the cure, having decided from the journalist's actions that humanity deserves everything it gets.
89	* HumansAreCthulhu: "Seven Views of Olduvai Gorge" follows a group of alien archaeologists studying Earth after the fall of the vast, tyrannical Empire of Man and extinction of the feared human race.
90	* LamarckWasRight: In the ''Widowmaker'' series, the main character is the most lethal fighter in the galaxy but contracted a disease with no cure. He had himself frozen until a cure can be found but due to maintenance expenses, the doctors unfreeze him to make bounty hunter clones. The clones have his memories and skills but have subtle (sometimes) differences.
91	* LossOfIdentity: The short story "Me and My Shadow" posits a world akin to that in ''Literature/TheDemolishedMan'', where convicted criminals are "erased" and given benign personalities. The narrator is one of these--except for the part where he still has a little voice in his head that tells him to kill people. And his new personality as an accountant is meticulous enough to make sure that this time, he won't get caught...
92	* MagicFromTechnology: ''The Buntline Special'' has Thomas Edison and Ned Buntline working under the auspices of the US government to find a way to circumvent Native American magic.
93	* MagicalNativeAmerican: In ''The Buntline Special'' Native American magic has been powerful enough to keep the United States of America east of the Mississippi as of 1881.
94	* MateOrDie: Resnick wrote a parody of "Literature/TheColdEquations" called [[http://web.archive.org/web/20100701075231/http://www.fortunecity.com/tattooine/farmer/2/Catastrophe.htm "Catastrophe Baker and the Cold Equations"]], in which the spaceship's pilot and the stowaway keep the temperature up by generating their own heat.
95	* RageAgainstTheAuthor: The story "His Award-Winning Science Fiction Story" includes bickering and negotiating between the stock science fiction characters and Resnick himself.
96	* SpaceSector: In the ''Starship'' series the Republic is divided into named sectors (the [=McAllister=] Sector, the Matheson Sector, the Terrazane Sector) which are collections of star systems complete with "capital worlds".

Context Creator / MikeResnick